#anyways just adding my two cents today I guess lmao

[logicheartsoul]

If you want an archive that is still around and still has chatting AND forums attached to it, fanfiction.net still exists. The chatting aspect isn’t like an instant messaging type chat you can get on tumblr and other sites, but you can talk to people privately sending messages and you can reply back — you can also get notified via email when this happens. It’s similar to the ask system on here and while I haven’t used it since 2018 (it was back when I was getting into yu yu hakusho again and someone had read a fic of mine I cross posted and we became friends — we still are but eventually got them interested into discord so that’s where we talk now). You can also get anons sending you messages privately too, I believe, it’s been forever.

(FF.net used to have a chat room for a time but that’s not here or there lmao Can you imagine going to some general chat room on AO3 and seeing in real time people interacting? *shudder* The kind of drama that could ensue…)

But yeah, ff.net has forums and you can actually go back and read threads lol I dunno which ones are still active but I did a random check and some were still active at least in 2018. So it does exist and you can witness a microcosm of fandom history if you scroll through it.

FF.net has “communities” which function more like collections do on AO3 where you can add stories, your own or others, to be listed and just decide to read them. I just did a check of that and people are still using and making “communities” on the site as of this year.

I do know the rampant amount of threads wanting ff.net staff wanting to stop from harassment and etc from users to each other and for them to have policies and actions to curb it. And this was back in it’s prime when millions of users were doing it — I can’t imagine how much bigger the abuse and support team would have to be to manage AO3 if there were forums or other social features.

AO3, from what I can tell, has always assumed there were going to be other means to communicate/build fandom communities. Livejournal and dreamwidth were still active during its inception and fandom forums were still also around. And, of course, tumblr was starting to make headway a couple of years into the archive getting off the ground, so it’s not like there haven’t been places to find and create community. In some ways, yes, modern social media has made it harder (making things more centralized/harder to find and to make sites for free and host your own forums and etc — all of that costs money to maintain, etc) but people will create things if it doesn’t exist, just look at how big discord is now.

The lack of social features was entirely conscious and on purpose and has probably saved AO3 from collapsing under the weight of unread Abuse reports.

[biffhofosho]

Common Ground

GIF by hyunubear

Fandom: Monsta X

Genre: Smut, natch.

Word count: 9.9k

Pairing: Kihyun x OC

Trope: Roommates to lovers

Synopsis: With the city on lockdown, Shay’s just looking to keep her sanity… and maybe finally get to know that tight-ass roommate of hers.

The Vibe: Pandemic lockdown desperation, fiesty hard-up OC with serious social withdrawal, workaholic roommate Ki with control issues and a sexy undercut, roommates who are essentially strangers until they’re not, searching for common ground, games with consequences, strip Battleship lmao, dom-sub themes, a bit of humiliation meant endearingly with just as much praise if not more, punishments for misbehavior, keeping quiet at all costs, unexpected feelings thundering to the surface, the start of something beautiful...

A/N: Whoa, before I could get into my Neo Seoul 3 fic or post my next Idol Thieves chapter, I got carried away by the muse. Like, rul bad. Deep in the Kihyun feels, I guess. I’m almost sorry about it. Almost.

It had been a difficult year for everybody, but today in particular, Shay was wallowing. The pandemic was still raging, her unemployment was about to run out, her bank account was dwindling, and there was still no sign of her company reinstating her, if it even survived the lockdown. Not to mention, her dim sum delivery was late, and there were few things as depressing as ice-cold, soggy dumplings. Worst of all, thanks to the never-ending stay-at-home order, loneliness was creeping relentlessly in.

Technically, Shay had a roommate, so, on the surface, she should have had a built-in friend to combat the isolation, but their arrangement was financial, not amicable. Kihyun was only that: a person occupying the same apartment as she was. Eight months into their tenancy, and she could probably count on one hand their number of in-person conversations. That wasn’t necessarily a complaint or a brag—they just didn’t talk, and that was fine because what did two opposing sides to the same coin have to say to each other anyway?

Kihyun was fastidious, the type to zip-tie all the loose cords and use a label maker to organize both their groceries on opposite sides of the refrigerator—including a whole honeydew he’d labeled with his name. He inventoried everything, too. Once, Shay snacked on one of his carrots with the full intention of replacing it on the next grocery delivery, but that same night, he had already added her fifteen-cent carrot IOU to their Venmo.

Still, it kept Shay honest, which was not her natural disposition. It had been her perennial New Year’s resolution to be more organized and aware like Kihyun, but she was lazy—the kind of lazy that made her question whether she had more genetically in common with a sloth than a human. She was the type to fold over a bag of chips and trust the air would just stay out lest it incur a typhoon of expletives on her next binge. Alarms were suggestions, and there was no such thing as an assigned seat on a couch—she parked it where she parked it, and she wasn’t getting up until she was thirty seconds from peeing her pants.

Yeah, Shay was a model human. Frankly, she wouldn’t have held it against Kihyun if he’d asked her to move by lease end, but they’d worked out an otherwise acceptable arrangement. They paid their halves of the rent. They bought their own groceries. They made their own meals and ate in their respective rooms. Excepting the kitchen, the common space was easily the least used room in the house. She wasn’t entirely sure that the TV in there had ever been on. If she saw Kihyun in the kitchen, she waited until he was gone to make her own food, and if she wanted a guest over, she would email him and request a time slot on their apartment calendar to have the place to herself.

It might be cosmically tragic, but it was also the nicest place Shay had ever lived. Kihyun was clean and polite and managed everything, which was fine because she was definitely too unorganized to do it. Once, at one of her old solo apartments, her furnace had gone out in the dead of winter, and she didn’t call the landlord for three weeks because it was just easier to pull an extra blanket over her head. But Kihyun was happy to do it all, and she was just as happy to let him. She remembered a word from science class a thousand years ago for just such an arrangement: symbiosis.

They could have easily finished out their lease this way and maybe even renewed for another if it weren’t for this damn pandemic. All the terrible news outside her walls was one thing, but after two months of staring out her window all day without even work to distract her, Shay was desperate for company.

As she picked up her dim sum from the hallway, she glanced at Kihyun’s door. Closed, as always. With a roll of her eyes, she headed back to her laptop to send her best friend Monique a video chat request. Only a minute later, and Shay’s screen was filled with the cherubic, coffee complexion of her bestie.

“Girl, this is, like, the third call today, and it’s barely past lunch,” Monique reprimanded.

“Shut up, you love me,” Shay fired back through a bite.

“I do, but that don’t mean I want to hear from you every ten minutes, especially when you got a whole ass dumpling wedged in your craw.”

Shay stuck out her tongue. “Wanna bring the other girls into the Zoom?”

“What I want is to take a nap. It’s, like, five hundred degrees in here. I’m sweating my lady lumps off just talking to you.”

“Lady lumps? Girl, no one ever called them that, let alone now.”

“What else am I supposed to call all these rolls and bumps?” Monique protested as she modeled herself like a show pony. “Sweaty as hell.”

“Ah,” sighed Shay. “I miss you.”

“Course you do, but—” There was a banging on the other side of Monique’s door, and she shouted at the top of her lungs, “What!”

Iesha, Monique’s pig-tailed little sister, threw open the door and barked, “Mom said you gotta help me with my science homework.”

Monique’s brows furrowed. “What part of a C student makes y’all think I know anything about science?”

“Then you can learn with me,” Iesha shot back effortlessly before she slammed the door and yelled from the other side. “Five minutes!”

Monique scrunched her face and rolled her eyes. “You see what I gotta put up with? Five hundred degrees, sweaty lady lumps, and I gotta go back to school again. Fuck this virus.”

“At least you have other humans to interact with,” Shay replied.

Her best friend furrowed her brow again. “What about that fine, snobby roommate of yours?”

“He’s not human. I’m pretty sure he’s a calculator or some shit.”

Monique bark-laughed. “Sorry, girl, wish I could entertain you, but I gotta go. Watch some porn or something. S’my favorite time waster. Okay, love you, bye, bitch!”

In a heartbeat, Monique’s screen went dark, and Shay was alone with her dumplings again. As soon as she finished them, she called a couple other friends, but none of them answered, though where the fuck they could be during a pandemic was beyond her. Unless, like Monique, everyone needed a break from her neediness.

Her best friend’s final suggestion weighed on Shay’s mind, but middle-of-the-day porn felt weird, so instead, she took a shower. It felt wonderful, but it hadn’t washed away her boredom or her ennui. A makeover attempt came next, but she didn’t like any of the eye shadow palettes she tried, and her foundation looked cakey, so she stripped back down to her glasses and freckles again. As a last resort, she made it through exactly six crunches before she just gave up and opened her browser.

Shay skimmed down Pornhub’s main page and clicked on a few things until she settled on an over-the-top roommates-to-fuck-buddies video. It was probably not as coincidental as she was trying to convince her mind it was, considering how much she’d been thinking about Kihyun today, but she insisted just so she didn’t feel as bad about it.

It was too hot to bother with the modesty of covers, not that it mattered considering Kihyun had never opened her door let alone bothered to knock. Still, the possibility was there, and that was enough to make her skin tingle and her core ignite. The thought of his handsome, stern face appearing in her door frame while she was spread eagle on her bed was so fucking sexy, she was almost ashamed of thinking about it.

Instead, Shay returned to the ridiculous plot line of one roommate getting stuck ass-out of the dryer while the other roommate took the opportunity to fuck her brains out. Stupid? Hell yeah, but the actors were hot, as was the dialogue, and the dude had a nice dick.

For a moment, she wondered what Kihyun’s dick looked like, but then the actress moaned especially gratefully in Shay’s headphones, and she returned to the scene at hand.

As the actor railed into the desperate woman from behind, Shay felt that familiar tightness spread across her hips, and she focused all of her attention on her needy clit now.

Suddenly, with a snap and a whir, the room went dark except for the eerie light from her monitor, which now featured a grayscale pixelated dinosaur and the horrific words “No Internet” instead of the messy money-shot she was promised. Her high fell away as spectacularly as if she’d been the victim of a good old-fashioned Ice Bucket Challenge.

“Fucking magical,” she groaned sardonically into her pillow.

Now she was frustrated in two ways.

She reached for her phone to hook up a hotspot, but there was that mocking sliver of red battery with its gleeful 3% warning in the corner.

“Fuck, Shay! Get your shit together,” she scolded.

She dug through her side table for her battery backup, but in some continued divine shamefest, the low charge LED was blinking back at her.

Damn her laziness to the darkest depths of Hell!

Shay collapsed onto her bed and stared blankly up at the ceiling questioning her every life choice. When this power outage was over, she was really and truly getting organized, so help her God.

It was already getting stifling without her window unit running, and, with a heavy sigh, she changed into a tank top and her most breathable yoga shorts, which had never been used for yoga anyway.

Shay padded into the living room, wrangling her chestnut hair back into a ponytail as a swell of heat hit her immediately. The soaring summer temps seemed as likely a reason for a brownout as any, and she immediately regretted leaving the lingering air conditioning from her bedroom. The hardwood was toasty under her feet where the butterscotch of afternoon funneled through the windows.

It was so clean in the common space, she would have thought it was for a lifestyle Instagram, though she couldn’t imagine Kihyun had any social media.

Shay peered across the neighborhood as neighbors flung open windows, lounged on fire escapes, and hung out laundry on alley clotheslines. She envied them. She didn’t even have a chore to occupy her.

Okay, that wasn’t true. Her room was a pigsty, but it was way too hot and she was way too lazy to embark on a journey through two weeks’ worth of dirty clothes and dishes.

Instead, she fished through her designated cabinet for a snack as the door to Kihyun’s room opened.

“You forget to pay the electric bill?” she joked when he joined her in the kitchen.

“Of course not,” he answered without looking at her.

“Of course not,” she echoed back.

It was weird, standing in the same room with her roommate. That should have been a stupid sentence, but it was true. Now that they didn’t even see each other in passing on their morning commutes, he had reverted to a virtual stranger.

“How’s it going?” Shay asked lamely.

Kihyun poured himself a glass of water as he replied, “Fine.”

He didn’t even give her the courtesy of asking her the same, and she wondered if he was either a total narcissist or painfully socially inept.

“Pretty hot in here, huh?” she continued, desperate for some human interaction, no matter how pitiful.

Kihyun shrugged and grabbed his water before heading back toward his bedroom.

“Wait!” Shay shouted. The word was out before she had the good sense to think about it.

He stopped and faced her for the first time in months. Fuck, he was better looking than she remembered.

His cinnamon hair sported a sleek undercut that was tousled too suggestively across his brow. A few errant strands shaded his dark chocolate eyes and high cheekbones, and the most irrational urge to comb it back buzzed through her fingertips. And then there was that ridiculously long expanse of sculpted neck just begging to be bruised, especially under his savage jaw line.

Damnit, she was too keyed up for this shit. Why was she torturing herself?

“Wanna hang out?” she asked.

He raised an eyebrow. “With you?”

“Well, you don’t have to make it sound like an insult, but yeah, who the fuck else?”

Kihyun glanced from the couch, back to her, and pursed his lips. “Uh, I guess.”

“What a confidence booster,” Shay replied as she grabbed a beer from her side of the fridge. “You want one?”

“I’m not a beer drinker.”

Guess that explained why he hadn’t bothered to label every can.

“I figured you for one of those fancy wine guys,” she said as she climbed over the back of the couch to get to her seat.

He let out a little sigh. “Are you really that lazy that you won’t just walk around to sit?”

How had she never noticed that cute little lisp of his?

She shrugged. “Yes, but this isn’t lazy; it’s ingenious. Shortest distance between two points or some shit.”

Kihyun shuffled over in his bare feet, and it occurred to her that it was the first time she’d seen him in shorts, let alone a t-shirt—he was almost always in a dress shirt and slacks because he was almost always at work. His legs were thin but toned, and Shay was insanely jealous of how smooth they were.

He sat as far away as possible on the couch, legs crossed, before he tipped his tumbler back for a long swig of water. It appeared Shay wasn’t the only one who was thirsty here.

Bitch, get a hold of yourself, she hissed in her head.

“I’m not a wine drinker either,” he added as he wiped his mouth, which was something that, frankly, should have been illegal.

“I take it you don’t drink then.”

“Whiskey.”

Shay stared at him skeptically. “You drink whiskey?”

“Not often and never enough to lose control,” he replied as his hand raked back those long locks from his face, “but if I’m going to drink, it’s what I like.”

“Yeah, control’s a pretty big thing for you,” she muttered under her breath as she glanced out the window.

“What was that?” His tone was sharp, and it made Shay’s blood race.

“Nothing,” she sang. “So, do you want to play a game or something to pass the time until the power comes back?”

Kihyun stood up as he said, “I think I’m going to—”

“Oh, come on,” she blurted far too desperately. “When’s the last time you had any kind of fun? What’s one stupid game between roommates?”

“I don’t play games,” he replied matter-of-factly.

“No, I know you don’t, unless you call counting carrots a game.”

He narrowed his eyes.

“I’m teasing,” she said with a laugh. “Come on, I’m insanely bored. Aren’t you?”

Kihyun shook his head. “There’s always something to do.”

“Well, yeah, but wouldn’t you rather do something that isn’t a chore?”

“Not really.”

Shay let out a frustrated sigh. “Okay, fine, then roommate-to-roommate, can you please just humor me once? I’m really fucking lonely, all right?”

Well, damnit. That was more than she had wanted to share with the man, but there it was, naked truth and all, still ringing up in the high ceilings. Shay swiveled toward the windows so at least her back was to him and he couldn’t see how red her face was.

“What did you want to play?”

She felt the couch dip as his words hit her ears just right.

“Let me go see what I have,” she mumbled as she headed back to her bedroom and dug around. She was back a few moments later with a sheepish grin. “Okay, so I don’t know how it’s possible that I don’t have a goddamn deck of cards or even a single ping pong ball, but this is what I got.”

She thumped a box on the table and savored how his eyes widened.

“Battleship? What are you, eight?”

“Shut up, I bought it for my nephew who didn’t get a birthday party this year, dick. I’ll buy him an xBox game or something. He won’t care.”

“I don’t want to play Battleship,” Kihyun said.

“Well, neither do I, so let’s give it some stakes.”

His eyebrow raised at this. “Loser pays all of next month’s rent?”

“Dude, yuck. You know my unemployment’s about to run out. Besides, that’s zero fun. What about…” Shay tipped her head back as she tested the waters. At this point, she had already embarrassed herself thoroughly and all her metaphorical cards were already on the table anyway, so she ventured, “Say, Strip Battleship? Every time you sink a battleship, you lose an article of clothing.”

“No,” Kihyun said without hesitation.

“Oh, come on. Afraid I’ll finally find that stick up your ass?”

“Don’t be dramatic.”

“I’m not dramatic. I’m adventurous and bored as fuck. Think about this: even the loser’s a winner. It’s hot as balls in here. Would be a great excuse to cool off...”

He glowered at her, as though he had heard everything she’d been doing just a little bit ago. “Why are you trying so hard to see me naked?”

The question hung in the heavy silence. That was not what she was trying to do, was it? Sure, Kihyun was objectively hot, and, yeah, it was a short walk to his bed, but despite the eight months they’d spent together, they didn’t know each other at all, and, up until this stupid porno she’d watched earlier, it really hadn’t occurred to her before.

Shay idly spun the box with a finger just to give herself something to look at other than Kihyun’s pretty face. “That is not it. I’m just trying to kill some boredom here. Are you really going to tell me regular old Battleship is going to entertain us otherwise?”

“Of course not—”

“No, of course not, see? And wouldn’t the potential of being totally naked be objectively more exciting?”

“Objectively, but—”

“Well, unless you can suggest something fun that doesn’t involve finances, I say we play. It’s not going farther than a little humiliation between roommates. Besides, we never see each other anyway, so who cares?”

“You’re quick with the excuses, aren’t you?” he said with something that looked dangerously close to a smirk.

Shay frowned despite how fucking adorable he looked. She didn’t appreciate him needling at her motives. Was it her fault she’d been knuckle-deep in an almost-release when the power cut out? Her body was still thrumming, and the heat and his sexy throat were only making it worse. At least if she got a peek at the goods, her brain wouldn’t have to romanticize something that wasn’t there.

Yeah, and what if it lives up to the imagination, girl? Ever consider that?

Shay kicked her libido in the face and unpacked the game.

“Fine, let’s just play normally. Just know I’m determined to destroy you anyway. Prepare for humiliation, Ki,” she said, helping herself to a nickname because an uptight guy like him needed one.

He cleared his throat, and when she glanced up from her board, she noticed his eyes were a notch darker, though that could have been the afternoon sun dipping behind the brownstones.

Even if they didn’t know each other well, Shay had a sense of Kihyun’s meticulous character, so she tried to pick the most illogical pattern she could. She clustered a number of her ships together, leaving oceans of open water to lure him away. When she was finished, she glared at him over the rim of her glasses and challenged, “Let me know when you’re ready for your whooping.”

He said nothing though his furrowed eyebrows spoke volumes. He opened his gameboard, too, and laid out his fleet in silence.

When he was done, she asked, “You know how to play, right?”

“Red pegs are for direct hits, white pegs are misses. Speaking of,” he dug into the little tray of pegs and scooped up a handful. “I think you gave me too many.”

He dropped them before she could catch them all, and they scattered all over her board and the cushion.

“Geez, you could have waited,” she griped.

“Sorry,” he replied, but he didn’t mean it.

The game was on.

Shay sneered at him as she said, “After that little stunt, I should make you go second.”

Kihyun smiled. “But you’re not going to.”

“It’s conditional. You’ve gotta talk with me in between strikes.”

“Fair enough.”

She bit her lip to hide her smile before she gave him the go-ahead nod.

“H1,” he said without hesitation.

“Damnit!” she wailed. “Are you fucking kidding me? Your first move? Ugh, that’s a hit.”

They marked their boards as Shay strategized. She tried to get into Kihyun’s head, but she couldn’t make it past those black vortexes in his eyes. He was studying her right back. She had to derail his momentum fast.

“So, what do you do when you’re not here?” she asked. “A6, by the way.”

Kihyun smiled and shook his head, and she sighed at her miss. His thumb pinched his bottom lip as he considered his next attack, and he said, “I catalog and review real estate leases for an acquisitions company. You?”

“That sounds awful.”

“I like the repetition,” he replied.

“Makes sense. And me? I don’t do anything now,” she lamented, “but when our company was open, I was a production assistant for local musicians. No gigs to book these days.”

Kihyun hummed, but she couldn’t tell if he was interested or just strategizing. After a moment, he said, “H2.”

Her heart sank with her littlest ship.

“You sunk my ship, you dick.” Shay thought he’d laugh or at least celebrate, but instead he stared at her—and not in the usual way he had been, alternating between inquisitive and confused, but dark and commanding. Her voice was gummy in her throat as she managed, “What?”

“You wanted to play Strip Battleship.”

Despite the heat in the room, her skin iced over. “Yeah, but you didn’t!”

“I changed my mind.”

Panic set in. Sure, this was her idea, but when she’d imagined it, she’d pictured him first to lose a shirt. She had four ships still floating but only three items of clothing left after this.

Kihyun smirked again, and now her cheeks warmed. As if he could read her mind, he said, “You can start with the ponytail. We’ll get to the rest soon enough.”

Shay swallowed hard, both at his confidence as well as the instruction. She pulled out the ponytail holder as her long brown tresses spilled down her back. In an instant, the temperature rose about a hundred degrees.

She did her best over the next few plays to land a single hit, but while she was learning more and more about Kihyun’s regimented life, she was also losing ships by the second. He’d figured out her strategy almost immediately, and now she was two ships and a shirt down with a third already primed with two of its three slots full.

“What do you do for fun?” she asked as she gnawed on her thumbnail.

“I clean and organize—”

“I said fun, Ki, not more work.”

“That is fun for me, but if you don’t accept that, how about cooking? I like doing that.”

“I never see you cook,” she said skeptically.

He shrugged. “You never leave your room.”

Shay blinked. He said it as though it bothered him. She wondered if she had left, if he’d have cooked for her, but then she thought about it, and he’d probably have charged her for the meal anyway.

Her eyes drifted back down to her game board as she mumbled, “Figured I’d get in your way. B9.”

“That’s your first hit,” Kihyun said, though there wasn’t an ounce of concern in his voice. And why should there be when she was about to lose yet another precious article of clothing. “By the way, you wouldn’t. Be in my way, I mean. You pay for half of this place, too, and I wouldn’t live with you if I didn’t like you.”

“You like me?”

Why the hell did she sound like a middle schooler talking to her crush? Jesus, she was lonelier than she thought.

Kihyun’s only answer was a “D3.”

Shay exhaled dramatically. “What’ll it be?”

“Lose the shorts.”

It shouldn’t have felt so risqué considering she was still essentially in a bikini, but the act of shimmying her tight yoga shorts over her hips and down her thighs made her feel totally naked. Well, that and the way Kihyun watched her do it. She swallowed hard.

Desperate to even things out, Shay fired off three more shots—all misses—until she finally landed a hit, and in the meantime, her fourth ship was sinking.

“A9,” she said, giddy.

“Your first victory,” he said with a smile that made his strong cheeks even more pronounced. “Congratulations.”

Shay rubbed her hands together, but before she could demand his shirt, Kihyun eased out his diamond studs she hadn’t even noticed he’d had in.

“Hey, no! No, no, no! You’re losing the shirt, buddy,” she protested, but he shook his head.

“I have more ships than I have clothes, and I let you take out your ponytail first.”

“Damnit,” she hissed. “I did not think this game through.”

“You did not,” he said with a light chuckle, “but I’m having fun.”

Shay rolled her eyes. “I’m sure you are.”

“C6.”

“Oh, Holy Mary, mother of God, fuck!” she cried.

Kihyun didn’t bother to hide his delight or his eagerness as his eyes flickered to her red bra. She wrinkled her freckled nose at him before she turned around and undid the clasp. She used her left arm as a basket for her ample chest, and when she felt as secure as she could, she turned back around and hunkered down behind her board.

“I think that should count as clothing,” he joked, motioning toward her makeshift arm-bra.

“Piss off, Yoo,” she griped as she planned her next strike.

She kept her head low and her eyes distracted as she continued through the motions, but she should have known it was inevitable. Within two more moves, he’d hit her biggest ship, and she was still firing blanks. Wow, 2020 really fucking hated her. Kihyun was so dead-on, it was unnerving. Excepting her obvious state of undress, Shay felt very exposed, and she hugged her chest tighter.

With a light throat clear, she said, “Probably should have asked this in the beginning, but you got a girlfriend?”

“No, not for a long time. Apparently, I’m difficult to live with. G5.”

Shay snorted as she put the third peg in her ship. “You? Nah. So… how do you blow off steam? B3.”

“Hit.”

Too little, too late for her.

It took him a moment to catch the meaning of her question, but when he did, Kihyun’s eyes widened. “Oh, well, some people have friends with benefits. I have acquaintances with arrangements.”

She raised an eyebrow. “That’s a new one.”

“We don’t talk or hang out. There are no expectations beyond the obvious, so there are no misunderstandings. Purely functional. G6.”

Shay should have expected such a matter-of-fact answer from him, but something about it depressed her. At least with friends, there was something more personal than the brief act of sex. Even a good one-night stand had passion and electricity. She frowned.

“You make sex sound like a library, except instead of checking out a book, you’re checking out a partner.”

“It’s nothing like that,” he retorted, although she could tell from the way his eyes flickered that he was thinking about it now. “What would you know about it anyway? You’re not in a relationship either.”

“How do you know?” she barked.

Kihyun turned around and glanced to their door surveillance system. “It’s always a different guy.”

It wasn’t an accusation, just an honest observation, but it did remind Shay of her lingering single status since she’d moved in. She gaped at her roommate and rolled her eyes. “Nosy asshole. And anyway, I’m just saying that sex is better when you’ve got a connection, not something you’re checking off a checklist.”

Kihyun tilted his head to catch the buttery glow of the evening sun in just the right way to bring out every hint of smugness. “Just for that, G7.”

Shay threw her head back and whimpered as she slipped the final peg into the final ship.

The corner of his mouth twitched. “Go ahead, say it.”

“You sunk my battleship,” she mumbled.

Kihyun closed his gameboard and folded his hands in his lap as he waited for her.

Shay struggled to figure out a way to remove her underwear without waggling all the goods in her roommate’s face, and she settled on a sideways stance and a one-handed shimmy that offered only an outline of her tits and ass.

“You know,” she pouted as she shuffled her other hand in front of her core, “you won that game suspiciously quickly.”

“It’s easy when I can see the reflection of your board in your glasses.”

Shay had a sudden flashback to those hastily dropped pegs at the beginning of the game, and she saw the true breadth of Kihyun’s devious nature. She thought about punching him, but that meant removing one of her protective hands.

“Cheater!” she bellowed into their living room.

He shrugged as he appraised the full swells of her hourglass. “Doesn’t matter. All that they’ll see when they look back on this day in the history books is that I won.”

“What a Machiavellian thing to say. You’re evil.”

“And fully clothed.”

Shay huffed and reached for her tank top, but Kihyun stilled her wrist with a strong grip. Her throat went dry. Her breasts were still safely cradled in her arm, but she’d had to sacrifice one hand, and now her naked pussy was on full display.

But Kihyun, to his credit, wasn’t ogling her body. He was staring into her eyes, and in so many ways, it was worse. His gaze was piercing, and Shay felt the irrational urge to kneel before him.

“I didn’t say you could get dressed yet.”

It wasn’t just an urge to kneel now—she thought her legs would give out under the weight of his smoky voice. He released her wrist and she stumbled back. “Kihyun, what—”

“Weren’t you the one complaining about the temperature in here? Leave them off.”

Nakedness aside, Shay had a much, much bigger problem now, and if she wasn’t careful, it would ruin the couch.

“It’s cooler this way, isn’t it?” he continued, a ribbon of silk under all that smoke in his voice.

She shrugged timidly and focused all her attention on finding a spot as far away from him as possible.

He shook his head. “You can’t sit naked on my couch.”

“Are you kidding me right now?” she shouted, cheeks blazing crimson as she wondered if he could see her leaking sex.

Kihyun just smiled. “You can sit on my lap though.”

At first, she thought that maybe she hadn’t heard him right, but he uncrossed his legs, his shorts rising just a bit higher, and patted his bare thighs.

“I should go,” she said slowly though she found her feet striding to him instead of her bedroom door.

“Why? I thought you wanted to hang out?”

Shay nodded numbly, lost somewhere between shock and a lust so overwhelming, it was disorienting. She sat side-saddle in his lap so she could keep her knees pressed together despite how urgently they begged to be parted. Her ass fell naturally into the crease between his thighs as her hands tightened around her chest and waist.

“Let’s just relax,” he said as he moved both of her hands to the sides of her thighs, baring all of her to the evening honey pouring through the windows. “Isn’t that more comfortable?”

“I guess.”

The tips of his fingers ghosted down her back while the top of his thumb traced her rigid spine. Goosebumps peppered along her whole body and her nipples tightened. Kihyun marveled at them. “Maybe you are cold after all. If you want, I can warm you up.”

Her breath came out much shakier than she’d hoped as she managed, “Okay.”

He flattened his whole searing hand along her back to smooth away the goosebumps, and Shay sucked in a sharp breath. His palms worked from her shoulders down to the swell of her ass and then around her rib cage to graze the sides of her breasts, growing bolder with every sweep.

“You smell good,” he murmured.

The only way to maintain some composure—and, with it, some of her dignity—was to keep her eyes firmly on the brownstones across the street. “I just took a shower.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about.”

And just like that, the last of her dignity went flying out the window.

Kihyun grabbed her stiff shoulders and pressed them down to release them. “I said relax, Shay. Here, let me help.”

He placed one of his hands on her mid-thigh, not curling around it, just resting warm and comforting like a blanket.

“You feeling warmer now?” he asked.

Warm wasn’t the word. Incinerated was.

“Yes.”

He inched his hand a little higher. “And now?”

“Warmer.”

His thumb bumped her mound, but still his hand rested innocently enough. “What about this, Shay? Does it make you hot?”

“Yes,” she said, but it came out more like a hiss.

“My thighs are getting soaked,” he observed. “Why would that be, Shay?”

Christ, the way he said her name was like a teacher scolding a student. She felt filthy in the most illicit way, and another rush of warmth raced to her sex.

“I would like an answer,” he said, and she shivered.

“Your hands—they feel really good.”

“Oh, so it’s my fault?” he said sharply, though now that innocent hand on her thigh was anything but. He stroked her folds as he massaged her leg, and with every stroke, more humiliating slick seeped out until his fingers were as glossy as her lower lips. Kihyun hummed. “I can be very nice to you, Shay, but you have to be nice to me.”

“Please be nice,” she whimpered, her body hunching over at his relentless teasing. But the hand on her back was now on her shoulder, keeping her posture nice and tall and her breasts high and perky.

“It wasn’t nice when you teased me about the carrots,” he said evenly, his fingers still sliding smoothly up and down her wet seam. “It wasn’t nice when you kept these pretty tits away from me after I earned them. Seems to me you weren’t very nice to me after all. I don’t think I need to be nice to you either.”

His hand disappeared from between her legs, and she glanced murderously at him.

“Shay.” She could hear the warning in his voice clear as glass. “I think it’s time for you to get on your knees.”

Desire rocketed through her. She couldn’t remember ever being so turned on. Usually, she was the one in charge, mostly because she had to be; otherwise, the guys she fucked around with would use her for their own end and leave her unsatisfied. Even then, Shay wasn’t a submissive person by nature, but in Kihyun’s hands, it came so naturally. There was an intense sensuality to his orders—each one a promise of pleasure for both her mind and her body. There wasn’t a single part of her that wasn’t stimulated by his voice.

Trembling, Shay slid off his lap and onto the floor in front of him. He looked down the bridge of his nose and straight to her heart. She sat on her heels, her hands in her lap, and stared right back.

“You make a lot of messes around this house. It’s time you start cleaning them up.”

His gaze slid to the slick puddles on the top of his thigh, and he spread his legs for her.

“Are—are you serious?” she asked.

“It’s not nice to question me,” he reminded, and a new river of wetness slipped down the inside of her thigh.

Shay inched between his parted knees and looked up. Kihyun didn’t move a muscle, yet his eyes were as firm as a spanking. She looked over to his glossy thigh and opened her mouth. She sucked gently, laving her tongue over his skin and tasting her own stickiness. It was shameful and humiliating and really, really fucking hot.

Kihyun didn’t make a sound.

After another minute, he said, “That’s good enough.”

Shay sat up and glanced at the bright red oval on his thigh that would no doubt bruise in the coming days. She thought about Kihyun walking around his room with her brand on him, picturing her mouth there again, so close to his cock. Maybe he’d touch himself.

The thought of a man with this much control stroking his own dick to the memory of her made her dizzy. She studied him as he leaned back on the sofa like a lord on his throne and ventured, “Did I do a good job?”

Kihyun’s eyes hardened, and she worried she’d done something wrong. Maybe he’d take himself away from her and they’d go back to being symbiotic strangers again. Just the thought paralyzed her. But to her relief, he said, “You’ve made another mess, Shay. Take care of it.”

He pulled down the lip of his shorts, and even in the lengthening shadows, his cock bounced out, rigid and leaking. She went to remove her glasses so they wouldn’t get in the way, but Kihyun grabbed her wrist.

“No,” he said, “leave them on. They’re cute.”

Shay didn’t need to be told twice. She pushed them up the bridge of her nose as she pressed her breasts against his thighs and slid his shirt up over his taut stomach. She couldn’t help it; she bit her lip, and for the first time, she heard Kihyun grunt.

Emboldened by his reaction, she wrapped her hand around the base of his cock and pumped his length. His skin was so hot, and the strength of his hard-on fed her vanity. She wanted to please him, so without another thought, she took him in her mouth.

Kihyun brushed her long tresses from her face and over her shoulder so her lewd act was on full display for him. She savored the tip of him first, lapping up the precum before she could get in trouble for not following another order.

He was salty and smooth, and surprisingly, he tasted really good. Shay had never particularly enjoyed giving head, but there was something about Kihyun that made her hungry for him. He watched her intently, as though he was going to grade her performance after, yet there was a softness to the edge of those espresso eyes as though he couldn’t believe she was going along with his instruction.

“Take me deeper, Shay. I know you can.”

Immediately, she opened wider and let him farther into her mouth. Her sucking grew louder and messier as she worked his base with her hand in time with her mouth.

“Just like that,” he said dreamily. He ran his fingers back through her hair, and she hummed into his gentle touch. She hadn’t expected it, but it made her skin prickle. Softer now, he said, “That’s a nice girl.”

Shay whimpered as her lips tightened reflexively around his shaft. Kihyun laughed. “It’s easy to be a nice girl when that nasty mouth is stuffed full of cock, isn’t it?”

This time, her cunt tightened along with her knees. Her thighs were so sticky, it was embarrassing. She thought about running into the bathroom to clean herself up, but she knew she’d get in trouble for that, too. Nice girls didn’t leave their roommate’s poor hard cock hanging unloved.

How was he sinking into her brain so fast? This was insane. It was like he’d hypnotized her with that soothing voice of his. She could have blamed it on her loneliness or her sexual frustration, but Shay knew it was neither of those things. She needed Kihyun’s approval—she craved it. She wanted him to stay with her.

“All right, Shay, that’s enough.”

She released him and sat back as she looked from his wet, red cock to his firm, brown eyes. “Did I do okay?”

“With a wicked mouth like yours, I knew you’d be great at sucking cock.”

He didn’t say anything further, and Shay figured if she wanted some relief from this unbearable ache she’d have to take over after all. She stood up and moved to straddle his lap, but Kihyun cupped her soaking sex full on and shook his head, his eyes black as the oncoming night.

“You don’t get to set the rhythm,” he warned.

Shay let out a frustrated breath. “I need you, Ki.”

He pressed his lips together as though he were struggling with something, but all he said was, “I know.”

She was frantic and pissed off and so fucking needy for a good dicking down, and all he wanted to do was torture her. She rubbed her pussy into his hand as her head kicked back from the sumptuous friction. “Can’t you please just put that big dick into my tight pussy and fuck me raw already?”

In one swift motion, Kihyun pinched her clit, sending her pitching forward onto his shoulder. He placed his mouth next to her ear and said, “You’re not in charge here. I earned you, so I’ll do what I want with you. You don’t get to ride me.”

“You’re lucky I’m lazy anyway,” she grumbled, and he scowled.

“Yeah, I’ve been meaning to address that. You need some discipline, Shay. I don’t want to hear from you unless you don’t like something, understood?”

“Yes,” she backpedaled instantly.

Still, Kihyun smacked her breast so hard, the sound reverberated off the exposed beams overhead, and a scarlet handprint appeared immediately on her tan flesh. “What did I just say? I’m tired of your backtalk. You are not to make a sound, even when I’m fucking you hard. If you can’t handle that, you can go to your room alone. Now, I’ll say it again: do you understand?”

Shay nodded, a prick of a tear in the corner of her eye as her chest throbbed along with her pussy. The mark on her chest stung, but not as much as the fear of not getting fucked.

She caught a hint of a smile, maybe relief that he hadn’t gone too far or maybe it was joy at finding someone who accepted this side of him; whatever it was, it was hot.

Kihyun released her sex and traded it for her wrist, and just as he did, the power kicked back on. The room flooded with light and beeps as the appliances whirred back to life. She stood there spotlighted in the nude, and he relished a long examination of her peachy nipples and well-trimmed pussy. He hummed.

A moment later, and he was dragging her back to her room, and for a split second, Shay panicked. She’d been a good girl, right? She hadn’t made a sound! Had he changed his mind now that the power was back on and he could go back to his business? She tugged on his arm and gaped at him, eyes wide with anxiety, but he smiled again, this one definitely amused.

“Aw, is my little pet worried I’m going to leave her un-fucked?”

Shay nodded furiously, and he traced the line of her jaw.

“Why would I do that? I’ve got such a nice girl here, don’t I? Nice girls get special privileges. Nice girls get to cum.” She looked at him with such relief that he laughed. He pulled her into her room and let go. “On the bed, nice girl. Hands and knees.”

Shay complied instantly. She waited on all fours, ass out and eager, but Kihyun didn’t join her. When she glanced back, she found him staring at her computer. The monitor was still on, and now that the Wi-Fi had rebooted, her porn video had refreshed. It was paused, but that didn’t matter. The video title was in big, bold letters, and he gravitated right to it.

“‘My Roommate Fucks Me After I Beg Him for Help,’” he read in his smoothest voice. He clucked his tongue. “And here I was, thinking you were such a nice, innocent girl when all along you just wanted me to put my dick in you. That’s a naughty girl, Shay. You’ve been very selfish, keeping your beautiful body from me for so long. That’s not very fair, is it?”

She shook her head.

Kihyun spanked her ass with the same ferocity he had her tit, but it was even louder in her cramped bedroom.

“And this room is filthy. Nice girls put their things away so when I come to fuck them, I don’t have to scold them for being lazy.”

He spanked her again, four more times on the same cheek. Each blow was like fireworks along her skin, sending tingles down her leg and to her core. Shay swallowed every cry because she had to and because, despite the pain, she hadn’t felt so alive in months. Every minute that ticked by became more unbearable, and her orders to keep silent were becoming increasingly difficult to follow.

She glanced over her shoulder and found Kihyun standing there in the corner of the room, just staring at her glistening, inflamed cunt and her reddening ass. Through the loose fabric of his basketball shorts, she could see how vicious his hard-on was, but the man had the self-control of a god.

Shay was on the verge of tears when, finally, he approached the side of the bed. Instead of climbing on and fucking her, as she expected, he came over to her face, tilted her chin toward him, and kissed her.

He was surprisingly gentle, placing soft kisses over her lips just to see if she would kiss him back, and something about it made her want to cry all over again. Gradually, his kisses grew more passionate, and his tongue quested for hers. It was electric, more than all the other teasing and scolding, like a light turning on inside her that had once been burnt out. She forgot she was naked in the middle of a well-lit room. She forgot the pain on her rear and her chest. There was only Kihyun and his kiss. This time, a tear did slip from her eyes.

Finally, he pulled back, and his gaze skirted to that traitorous droplet. He wiped it with his thumb and said, “You’re a good girl, Shay.”

With that, he undressed, and she could finally appreciate how handsome his form was. He was lean and wiry, with an attractive tone to his stomach. He wasn’t muscled like some of the guys she’d messed around with, and his knees were gangly, but he was so beautiful—the perfect combination of all the best things.

“I want to fuck you now,” he said.

She nodded, every nerve ending firing at just the promise of his touch.

Kihyun climbed onto the bed behind her and slid one finger into her pussy. Shay winched her eyes shut and bit her lip, nearly breaking the skin, before a moan could escape. He dragged the pad of his finger down the front of her walls slowly, as if he were mapping her from the inside out. She trembled and gripped the sheets as tightly as she could.

“No one has ever responded to me the way you do,” he murmured as he withdrew his finger. As if to prove his point, he swirled it around her swollen clit and sent her pitching forward into her pillow. She couldn’t hold back her whimper, but either the pillow swallowed the sound or Kihyun took pity on her because he kept going until she was a shuddering mess.

Just before the knot inside her frayed, however, he stopped. He placed one hand over the rosy print on her ass, and she winced, expecting another spank, but instead, he rubbed it slowly. The tenderness was as erotic as his orders were, and she pushed back into it. The tip of his cock bobbed against her dripping folds, and Kihyun let out a slow sigh.

“Back on your hands, Shay,” he reminded, and she reluctantly left the safety of her pillow.

The head of his member roved up and down her slippery seam and slapped against her clit a few times for good measure. She held back her needy mewl just in time, but it was killing her. She didn’t think she’d ever been this quiet in her whole life—she’d been kicked out of libraries before, for fuck’s sake—and now she was being asked to hold back just how good he was making her feel? It was too cruel.

At last, he centered himself at her entrance and pushed in.

It was sinful and sweet, like a stolen chocolate-covered cherry during a month-long fast. Nothing had ever been more delectable. Behind her, even her disciplined roommate was succumbing to their connection. He let out a little hum that ended in a forceful grunt, and all Shay wanted to do was kiss him again.

But there was no time for that. Kihyun delved deeper into her, inch by inch, until he reached his hilt. He waited there, letting her cunt squeeze him as it adjusted to his size.

Thanks to the pandemic, Shay hadn’t been fucked in months, so maybe she was being dramatic, but no one had ever filled her up better. Even the bigger dicks she’d experienced hadn’t stimulated her like Kihyun’s did. She was ravenous for him.

Slowly, he pulled out and then, just as slowly, pushed back in, long, smooth motions that threatened to tear whines and begging from her lips. He didn’t begrudge her the soft panting she made, but maybe that was because he was making the same sounds, too, or it was simply too hard to hear over the squelch of her drenched cunt.

As Kihyun picked up speed, the room became a blur. Shay tried to focus on anything to distract her from how good it felt when he stretched her wide, but no amount of lip-biting could dam the moans swelling in her chest. Her elbows gave out, and she fell into her pillow and strangled out a tiny cry.

He took her more ferociously now, quick and deep and perfectly smooth because there was no part of himself that he didn’t control. The friction ignited a fuse in her walls that was quickly burning up.

“Don’t cum,” Kihyun warned. “It’s not your turn.”

But how could she hold back a freight train of pent-up frustration just ready to spill? Shay wedged her eyes shut and bit into her forearm, but it wasn’t enough. She couldn’t hold it.

Kihyun pulled out and it took every last atom within her not to scream.

“I said it’s not your turn,” he snapped. “On your back.”

Shay rolled over and spread her legs, and he settled between them immediately. He brought his cock back to her cunt, but instead of watching himself slide back in, he caught her gaze. With a firm thrust of his hips, he drove inside her.

This angle gave Kihyun all the ammunition for his continued torture that he could possibly want. One sinister hand grabbed a handful of her tit while the other rubbed her flushed clit. In a matter of moments, she was on the verge of release again, but still he grunted, “Don’t you dare cum.”

Shay shook her head violently and grabbed at his wrist, but he shook her off.

“This pretty pussy has to wait.”

He spread her legs as wide as they could go as he gnawed on his lip. Fuck, he was gorgeous.

“So wet, so wet,” he murmured. “God, I wish I could—”

But he cut himself off and pulled out, and with a cry more desperate than she would have ever expected from a man like him, Kihyun shot his load all over her little landing strip of hair. Pearls of ivory splattered against her belly and all over her mound as he pumped through his release with little grunts of ecstasy.

His panting slowed as his eyelids drifted shut, and after a moment, he climbed up beside her face.

Breathy and tired, he said, “Clean me up.”

Shay opened her mouth, and he slid in immediately, letting her suck him clean of all her mess as well as his. He gasped as she sucked the head of his sensitive cock and scolded her to go easier. When he was satisfied with her work, he backed off, and with eyes still black as coal, he added, “Now, clean yourself up.”

He placed her fingertips over the milky white mess between her legs and guided one of her fingers through it before he led the glistening bead back to her lips.

“Do a good job, and you get to cum.”

Her shock faded away as eagerness replaced it. Her pussy was throbbing and her limbs were tired from the perpetual haze of near release, and the only thing that mattered right now was his promise. She swept her hands through his spilt seed and fed it all to herself. Dignity was a thing for bad girls anyway.

Beside her, Kihyun smiled. “You’re special, Shay.”

She grinned around her sticky fingertips before she finished sucking them clean, and then she presented her hands for his inspection.

“What a nice girl. Now, let me make my nice girl feel as nice as she made me feel.”

Kihyun laid down beside her, his sweaty body pressing against hers. His hand settled between her legs as his mouth settled over hers. He kissed her again, his tongue seeking entrance immediately this time. He could taste himself on her tongue mixed with her essence, and he sighed.

While he kissed her fervently, his middle finger slid between her pussy lips and drenched itself in her honey. A moment later, it was joined by a second finger, which slid in just as easily. His fingers were so much longer than hers, and they could reach much deeper into her. They curled up into her wall, beckoning her release forward for the final time.

He broke their kiss to slide down her body and watch as his other hand worked her clit in time with his finger fucks. He studied each circle his fingers made to target the special spot on her clit made her thighs tremble, and when he found it, he worked it again and again.

“I want to watch you cum, baby. Show me how sexy you look unleashing all over my fingers. Nice girls show their lovers.”

Kihyun’s words were all it took to send her catapulting into ecstasy. She squirmed and bucked into his grasp as his fingers fucked her through her release. Stars danced behind her eyes as a long moan of his name tumbled forth, unable to be held back any longer.

“Wow,” he whispered, entranced by her shivering pink heat and the sound of his name still ringing in his ears. “Beautiful.”

Shay collapsed onto her bed, not an ounce of strength left in her. Most of her orgasms were faked just to end lackluster sex, but this one was still traveling through her body, sending little spasms through her belly and down into her toes.

Kihyun hummed, that small smirk on his face. “I made this mess, so I’ll clean it up.”

In a flash, his fingers were in his mouth, each digit meticulously sucked clean, before he slipped his head between her thighs and rolled his broad tongue over her folds with the same precision. Despite her mewls and jerks, he held her fast and licked her until he was sure she was clean.

When he was done, he slid beside her and draped an arm over her stomach. With an astonished laugh, he said, “You can speak now.”

“Holy fucking hell, finally,” she blurted, and they both smiled. “Fuck, that was insanely good, Ki. We could have been doing this the whole time? Fuck. Why didn’t you ever knock on my door?”

She expected a quick barb or some other wit, but instead, only the white noise of the window unit answered. She turned toward him. His brown hair had fallen into his eyes as his chin rested on her shoulder.

“You live a lot more than I do,” he replied quietly. “It’s… intimidating. You’re intimidating.”

Shay laughed. “I’m intimidating? After all that shit you just pulled?”

But Kihyun was dead serious, his hand tracing her throat as his voice softened even further. “You’re not afraid of the world or being a part of it. I’m not comfortable unless I’m controlling it, so I keep to my corner.”

Shay brushed his hair back and smiled. “Well, you can come to mine whenever you want. I’ll show you around. Maybe you’ll like what’s out there, and if you don’t, you can bring me back to your corner, and I’ll let you boss me around for a bit—within reason. But you should know, I don’t want to be one of those books you check out when you feel like it.”

Kihyun considered her words before he answered, “I thought you liked that. With those other guys—”

“Not with you, okay?”

His hand curled around her waist and squeezed lightly. “Okay.”

Shay’s heart buoyed, and suddenly, the prospect of another few months of lockdown didn’t seem quite so daunting.

“But before we do this again,” he said warily, “we’re cleaning your room.”

“We?”

“I—well, yeah.” Those high apple cheeks were polished bright pink, and they were so cute, she let out a hum.

“Ki?”

“What?”

“You can sleep in here tonight if you want.”

He sat up on one elbow and looked down at her. “Is that what you want?”

“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t, you dope.”

He held her for a minute, his eyes closed as well as hers, and then suddenly, he blurted, “How about my bed instead? I think we need to wash your sheets.”

“Fine, your bed,” she groaned.

“But shower first.”

“Oh my god, you’re so demanding.” A flash of a pout danced across his features, and Shay waved it off. “I’m just teasing, Ki.”

He stood up and offered his hand to her, but as soon as she took it, he tugged her naked body to his, and she could feel his fresh hardness against her hip.

“You know what happens to girls who tease me.”

[golbrocklovely]

I didn’t want to put my two cents in but I guess here I am lol anyways I get what you’re saying about stans being quick to defend their faves but what’s there to defend when someone respectfully and kindly says they don’t like certain content? at that point it goes beyond “defending” it’s basically just a bunch of stans trying to silence someone else’s opinions and thoughts :/ which i do feel like you and the other anons were trying to do. This isn’t hate but i just wanted to share a bystanders perspective on it lmao

even tho i said i was done talking about this, i'm gonna answer this ask and then one other that i just got. after this, i'm not talking about this anymore today. if you or any other anon send in another ask about this topic, i'm just gonna ignore it and not answer it for the sake of my own sanity lol

from my perspective as someone who has been in colby's fandom a while, i feel like a lot of us are on the defense when it comes to him. colby gets hate for a lot of dumb fucking things. are there things he's done that is messed up and worth talking about/calling him out for? 1000%, and i do that when it happens. however, there is a lot of stuff that he does that gets hate even tho he did nothing wrong. all he did was exist and that's enough reason for ppl to hate him. hell, that's why he's not on twitter that much anymore, bc for months on end he got hate every time he tweeted. so he just stopped. he only recently started to dip his toes back in the hellscape that is twitter.

that being said, bc of this onslaught of hate, i feel like a lot of fans are on the defense with him, ready to defend him whenever. and especially when it comes to girls, bc there's a lot of internal fighting in our own fanbase. some fans are super disrespectful to the girls, some to the both of them, some try to tell ppl not to talk about it bc it starts drama, some ship it to hell and back, some argue over who's the best fit for him... it's a never ending shit storm when it comes to his love life and our opinions on it. i try to remain positive and neutral bc at the end of the day, it doesn't effect me in the slightest. do i find his love life interesting nonetheless? yeah. but i don't really focus on it outside of on here and when we're all just discussing it together anyway.

and i think a lot of problems happens bc it's hard to indicate tones when ppl are discussing on here (or online in general). you can't tell if i'm being serious or sarcastic, or outright yelling at you. even if i say i'm being light hearted about something, it's still hard to tell. so i think that's where problems can arise.

for the two anons that posted about not liking the content amber and colby make, even tho i don't agree with them, that doesn't mean i was hating on them. bc i even said in both of those asks 'i might not agree but i get why you feel the way you do'. and i would like to argue that there is no way i'm silencing them when i'm literally answering their asks. silencing them would be not answering the ask at all.

and the other anons weren't silencing them either. they were just disagreeing.

i let my ask box be a space where anyone, regardless of if i agree with your opinion or not, is allowed to discuss things that have to deal with snc. i let everyone speak, minus the handful of times i've gotten hate or have been sent mean things about other ppl (those i don't post and only sometimes address if necessary). i have no way of stopping an ask coming in that disagrees with another anon. if i think the ask is super mean, calling the anon names or something like that, i won't answer it.

the two anons that disagreed with the previous two maybe could have been nicer, but i don't believe they were trying to be malicious to the other anons. they were just saying what they believed, much like the previous anons were doing. i think their intentions got lost in translation bc of a lack of tone (and also jumping the gun to defend colby) and it came across as rude. and even tho i didn't agree with the previous anons, i still added in their view point when i responded to these anons.

at the end of the day, you should do what makes you happy. if watching amber and colby's content doesn't do that, then stop watching it. idk how else to explain it.

fandom discourse should be fun and light hearted bc that's what it's meant to be. we're all talking about ppl that don't know us for christ's sake. let's have a little fun with it and try our best to be respectful of ppl's opinions, regardless if they go against our own.

[uiruu]

i saw that post about using nouns as verbs a lot and i finally just had to say something lol

tumblr’s just finding out about verb derivation lmao. the more specific term i guess would be “conversion” because we don’t slap any derivational endings onto the noun to make it a verb (to “verb” it), but like, that’s not really what’s going on, that misses the point a bit. see like, if english used verb endings still like other germanic languages do, then we would. and like, we do add -s and -ed in the 3rd singular and past tense respectively. but like, you can see in the older verbified nouns that there was some difference.

house vs “to house” as in “to house something”. house ends with an /s/ sound, while to house ends with a /z/. that’s most likely because originally the verb had a vowel after it. /haus/ vs /hauza/ or something. i’d have to look it up but im pretty sure, using german as an analogy. it was probably a schwa but i dont feel like copying and pasting (two verbified nouns) one. so, anyway, that thing happens occasionally. the /s/ got voiced when between vowels into /z/, but the vowel at the end disappeared, leaving the voicing as the distinction. but that wouldnt have happened for noun/verb pairs like “sound” or whatever, so when we make new ones in modern english, we dont retroactively treat it as if it would have had a vowel. for instance, “mouse”. it rhymes with house and always has even historically, hence the spelling. so if we say “mouse” as a verb, probably in reference to a computer mouse, we dont say “mouze”. why? because that was created now and not in the past, and we dont bother treating it as if it was an older word. if “mousen” or whatever was a verb from a lot earlier, it probably would be “mouze” today just like house is, but it’s not.

um anyway, this got a little away from me, my point is just that every language does this. every single one. every one of them. there are various ways to do it, some use suffixes, some just tack verb endings on, and some, like english, just use word order and nothing else to turn nouns into verbs. it happens a lot with adjectives too. and vice versa by the way, you can use verbs as nouns. we most often do it by adding -ing, but you don’t have to, it’s just that if you don’t it’ll sound really funny. i remember hearing griffin mcelroy ask if someone was pretending to eat a bone, but he didnt say that, he said “are you larping a bone eat?” larp being an example of noun-to-verb, and eat being an example of verb-to-noun. larping is standard english (though not a standard vocab word lol. but that’s a really standard way to turn a noun into a verb) and eat as noun isnt standard english, but you know what it means when you hear it, which means it is grammatically correct. 

linguistics! anyway yeah i see posts like that sometimes and i like giving my two cents as a linguist